The first time I interviewed John Ternus was ten years ago to discuss the new MacBook. Like the MacBook Neo before it, this small, 12-inch, 2-pound laptop was a departure for Apple. It was full of unusual and innovative design decisions, and John Ternus, who will become Apple’s CEO in September, couldn’t wait to talk about them.
At that time, Ternus had already been working at Apple for 15 years, leading Mac and iPad hardware. He struck me as intelligent, affable and with a lively mind.
Looking back on that meeting and the discussions that followed, including our most recent meeting shortly after Apple unveiled another piece of hardware design – the iPhone Air – I realize that in my quest to understand the kind of Apple CEO Ternus will be, I may already have all the information I need.
Article continues below
A firm hand
Perhaps Ternus enjoys this collaboration so much because it provides a level of stability he can only dream of.
“One of the most amazing things to me is how stable things are, from the first models we make to the products we ship,” he told me in 2015.
It’s clear from these discussions that Ternus is probably not prone to wild flights of fancy and doesn’t appreciate sharp left and right turns throughout the product development process.
This sentiment is echoed somewhat in what Ternus shared with Spoonauer and me last year after the iPhone Air launched: “I think the reality is that the best invention in engineering comes from constraints.”
Now, I understand that Ternus was referring to the physical constraints present in the ultra-thin iPhone Air, but there is also a hint that Ternus might like to set up product development frameworks and then work within them to get the best results from the design and engineering teams.
What “no” means at Apple
There is, however, evidence of flexibility. In 2015, Ternus explained a particular philosophy at Apple around the word “no.”
“There are ‘no’s’ in a way. There are ‘no’s’ in what we do, but when it comes to how we do it – creating the best product, there really aren’t many ‘no’s’. That’s one of the great joys of working here. [For] something truly compelling, we can afford to make.
The other thing I took away from this comment is how much Ternus loves Apple. According to his LinkedIn profile, this is actually only the second place he has worked. Perhaps even more so than Tim Cook when he took over as CEO in 2011 (after about 14 years with the company), Ternus is a product of Apple.
Discipline, Collaboration, long-term integration, saying no at the right time to be able to say yes, all elements that should make John Ternus a particularly product-focused CEO who knows the Apple way and how to get things done.
He may have a blind spot or two when it comes to purely business activities, supply chain and geopolitical pressures, but when it comes to the gadgets consumers are most interested in, they probably couldn’t ask for a better replacement for Tim Cook.
Follow TechRadar on Google News And add us as your favorite source to get our news, reviews and expert opinions in your feeds.
